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As an example - Official Apple Stores have hurt mom&pop Apple stores. Apple ultimately makes money either way, but they make more money if they sell them at the
by tdiggity 12y ago
As an example - Official Apple Stores have hurt mom&pop Apple stores. Apple ultimately makes money either way, but they make more money if they sell them at their own Apple store. Why would you go to the mom&pop store if an Apple store were nearby? There have also been reports that they don't give the 3rd party shops new models until much later, so they are at even more of a disadvantage. Try buying that new Macbook Pro the day it's released at a 3rd party store. It probably won't be available.
Back in the day, the dealers banded together so that wouldn't happen to them by making it law.
- mikeash 12y agoOne thing I don't understand is why the dealers didn't play the manufacturers off each other to mitigate the problems. I can see that, for Apple dealers, it could be a major problem. Apple products are a specific niche, and you can't take your Apple dealer and turn it into something else with much hope of success. Selling PCs is a pretty different business. But when it comes to car, surely selling Fords is much the same as selling Toyotas? If Toyota treated a dealership badly, why wouldn't they shop around for a brand that would treat them better? Is it that the American car manufacturing industry wasn't sufficiently competitive for that to work when these laws were being written?
- mortenjorck 12y agoI'm going to guess there's a pretty strong non-compete built into the standard dealership contract.
- jessaustin 12y agoBut there are many dealerships that have like ten different brands?
- mikeash 12y agoYeah, definitely doesn't seem to be the case around here. Some local dealers are just one company, but some represent a vast quantity, e.g.: http://ourisman.com/ http://ourisman.com/ http://www.koons.com/ http://www.koons.com/ http://www.lindsaycars.com/ http://www.lindsaycars.com/